Monday was brighter with some spells of sunshine interspersed with snow showers with the bitingly cold easterly wind continuing. As I’d half expected yesterday, Monday took the honours as the coldest day of the month.
In the sunny spells the thermometer made it up to the dizzy heights of 1.9°C but even the daytime temperatures fell below freezing as the clouds and snow showers rolled in. In the end the average daily temperature finished at -1.2°C. The last time I recorded a minus average daily temperature for March was 07 March 2010 with -0.9°C.
It’s just a question of keeping warm and waiting for the weather to improve. This collared dove looked like it was hoping for an improvement as it sat out the cold conditions in our crab apple tree.
There’s no doubt that we are off to a much slower start to our gardening activities this year than last. Conditions have been such that we haven’t visited the plot in a couple of weeks. At home we had certainly started off more seeds last year so I thought it was time to make a comparison.
Last year by this time our we had already sown the following:
- 26-Feb-12 Broad Beans Witkiem Manita (In modules in cold greenhouse)
- 06-Mar-12 Aubergine Early Long purple 3 (indoor grow light)
- 06-Mar-12 Cabbage Golden Acre - Primo 2 (indoor grow light)
- 08-Mar-12 Leeks Blue Solaise, GiantWinter, and Lyon 2 Prizetaker (In modules in cold greenhouse)
And later on in March the following seeds were sown:
- 20-Mar-12 Phacelia green manure directly in the plot
- 21-Mar-12 Tomatoes Alicante, Amish Gold, Gardeners Delight, Jakarta F1, Moneymaker and San Marzano (indoor grow light)
- 21-Mar-12 Peppers Jimmy Nardellos's, Palladio, and Planet F1 (indoor grow light)
As far as I’m concerned I’m a little bit late but there’s no need to panic. After a good start in March last year we had a very poor April and May which slowed down or almost stopped the aubergine, peppers and tomatoes plants in their tracks. This year I’m going to delay sowing them by a couple of weeks and hopefully will avoid the worst of any cold setbacks when the seedlings are moved into the cold greenhouse.
That leaves broad beans, cabbages and leeks which I’ll attempt to sow in the greenhouse this week. I don’t think any of the seeds will be frosted but germination times might be slowed down if the cold weather persists.
That just leaves the plot to be sorted out!
Dreaming of things to come.
Posts
I haven't started many things off, but I do want to get some more things going before the end of March. If only it would warm up a bit.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking about sowing some broad beans in pots in the greenhouse but even in there it's below freezing most nights so I'm not sure there's any point. It must start to warm up a bit soon.
DeleteI haven't really got going this year yet last year I loads on the go by now but this year I want to eave it as late as I can. And this snow isn't helping much
ReplyDeleteI haven't even been down to the plot for about a month. I'm waiting for the weather to improve too like you are. I reckon sowing seed when the temperatures struggling to reach 5°C each day is a complete waste of time.
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